Starscream and the Twelve Dancing Princesses
by Alexis Raphael
Summary: Starscream, Skywarp, and Thundercracker are on a mission to procure a component for Megatron, but when they hear of the offer in which whoever finds out where the king's twelve daughters go to dance all night gets one of them as his wife and inherits the crown, they can't resist.


**Starscream and the Twelve Dancing Princesses**

On the distant planet of Cybertron, there once was a king who had twelve beautiful daughters. They all recharged in the same room, and when they went to bed the doors were always shut and locked up; but every morning their exterior foot plating was found to be worn through as if they had danced all night. Nobody could find out, whether by direct questioning or more subtle means, how it happened or where they had been.

The king made it known to all the land that if anyone could find out what went on, he could have the princess he liked best for his wife (female

'bots were excluded from this offer)and would inherit the crown; but if he didn't succeed after three days and nights, he would be terminated.

Soon, a prince called Hot Shot came and he was treated with the best of hospitality and shown to a room next to the princesses'. But Hot Shot soon fell asleep and woke up late the next afternoon to his servant shaking him mercilessly. The same thing happened the next two nights, and at the end of the time period, he had not achieved the goal. In light of that, Prince Hot Shot was shot.

After him came many, many more, and all of them lost their lives fro the same reason, though not all of them were _shot_; some were beheaded, impaled, electrocuted, etc. The undertaker was delighted.

Now, it chanced that a red jet came along. He and his three flying partners were on a mission for their commander to fetch some component or other, but when he heard about the princesses, he persuaded his companions to try their luck and possibly win a pretty girl. Reluctantly, the other two agreed.

"Hey," the red jet said, "If we don't discover the secret, and the king decides to kill us, we can always shoot our way out."

"Yeah, Starscream." The black one grinned back, "And we can take the femmes with us!"

"Whatever," the blue one grumbled, "I don't know what I'd do with a femme. Let's just get this over with."

The red jet, Starscream, smirked and led the way. As he walked past the blue, the black whispered, "T.C. and a princess sitting in a tree K-I-S-S-I-N-G! First comes love, then comes marriage, then comes the sparkling in the sparkling carriage! " That earned him a punch in the gut.

Presently, they met an old 'bot who called himself Kup.

"Where are you young whippersnappers going in such a hurry?" he inquired in a creaky voice.

"We are not young whippersnappers, old geezer!" exclaimed Starscream indignantly, "we are warriors for the Decepticon cause!"

"Heck with all that jazz, I ain't no geezer" the older 'bot snorted, "Where be you going so fast?"

The black jet looked at his companions and said, "We're going to the castle to find out where the princesses go to dance every night, and we'll succeed and get some pretty femmes! Do you want us to bring you back a pretty femme?"

Starscream growled and the blue jet facepalmed.

"No, but if you wish to achieve your goal, I have some things to help you. I have a cloak that makes you invisible, and some advice."

"Save it, geezer." Starscream pushed past Kup. "Come on you two."

"Starscream," the blue jet said, "Don't you think we should at least accept the advice?"

"Nah", his partner replied carelessly, "we'll do it easy."

The blue jet shook his head and followed the red.

The three were well received, just like all the others, and shown to the same room the others had occupied. Before long, the oldest princess came in with some energon drinks.

"What are thy names, soldiers?" she said.

"I am Starscream," Starscream said, and motioned his comrades to introduce themselves.

"Skywarp, the grooviest jet around!" the black said with a grin.

The blue just said with a frown, "Thundercracker."

"My name is Chromia. Welcome to my father's kingdom, friends. Please refresh yourselves with this." She then turned and left.

"Well," Skywarp said, "Shall we dig in? Those drinks look tempting!"

Starscream shoved the other jet out of the way and said, "No drinks. There might be something in them."

"Like what?" Skywarp wasn't convinced.

"I don't know! Some kind of sleeping pill, or something. Just shut up."

"So how do we figure out where they go?" Thundercracker asked.

"We take turns. Skywarp, you can have the first night. Find out where the princesses go to dance. Thundercracker, you've got the second. I've got the third."

"All Right!" Skywarp let out whoop of joy and plopped down in a chair to wait.

"Thundercracker, you and I may as well get a good night's recharge." Starscream led the way to the huge, soft beds.

"Watch out, dudes!" Skywarp's voice drifted to them, "I'm gonna have this mystery solved in no time!"

The next morning, Starscream and Thundercracker awoke to find their companion asleep in his chair. He hadn't moved from the night before.

"Holy guacamole!" he yelled upon being woken up, "Don't tell me that I _slept_ through the whole thing?!"

"You did, Warp." Frowned Thundercracker.

"No! No! Say it isn't true! Please, Screamer! Tell me it isn't so!" The black jet wailed.

"It is true, Warp, and unless you don't want to meet your end now, don't call me Screamer!"

The day passed tranquilly, and by the time night came, Thundercracker was confident over what he was about to do.

"Have fun, T.C.!" called Skywarp cheerily from his bed.

"Just clam up, Warp." Grumbled Thundercracker from the chair.

When Starscream awoke the next day, he found Thundercracker sleeping on his left and Skywarp snoring on his right.

"What's all this about?! He shouted, sitting up.

"Huh?" Skywarp rolled over and rubbed his eyes.

Thundercracker groaned and sat up.

"What's this about?" Starscream repeated.

Thundercracker stifled a yawn and said, "Sorry, it was dark and I was tired. Didn't know anyone was in here."

Starscream growled and turned to Skywarp. "You?"

"What about me?"

"Why are you in my bed?"

"There were monsters under the dresser!"

"And you were scared so you decided to do the dumbest thing you could do and crawl in with me! When I'm through with you, you'll wish you'd faced the 'monsters'!"

Starscream had no time to make good on his threat, however, as a servant informed them that breakfast was ready.

"Find anything last night?" Starscream looked at Thundercracker.

"Yeah, but the princesses don't know it. You should still try your luck with it tonight."

"I will, and I know just how I'm going to do it."

That night, Starscream took up vigil in the chair and the other two went to bed. He heard Skywarp say to Thundercracker, "Hey, can I recharge with you tonight?"

"Why?" came Thundercracker's voice, "And don't tell me it's because you're scared of the monsters under the dresser."

"But they were _freaky_, and it's so dark T.C.! Please?"

"No, Warp."

"But the dark is so frightening, and creepy and, well, _dark_!"

"[Sigh] if any of them come after you, just wake me up and I'll scare them off. Besides, it's not the dark you should be afraid of. It's what's _in_ the dark you should fear. Now go to sleep."

"Thanks for all the reassurance, T.C. I really feel better now that you've succeeded in freaking me out more than I was before!"

"Want a ghost story?"

"NO!"

"Then shut up."

Starscream grinned in the dark, thinking that T.C. wasn't as cold and mean as he pretended to be. They were, after all, practically family. He checked the time and saw that the hour had struck.

Smirking a bit, he made his way to the princesses' room and boldly marched in.

"Where do you go every night?" he demanded to their startled faces. After a moment of shock, one of them, Moonracer, Starscream recalled from the introductions, said, "I'm not going to tell you!"

"If you don't tell me, then I'll shoot your sister." The red jet raised his null ray.

The princesses paled a bit at that, but Moonracer said, "You're bluffing! You wouldn't shoot an unarmed femme!"

Starscream fired the null ray at the one called Slipstream, turned to the princess, and said, "There. Tell me what I want to know, and I won't shoot anyone else."

Moonracer and her sisters gathered about their fallen sibling, and Chromia said, "You're a monster! When I tell my father about this, he'll have your head!"

"What have I got to lose? If I don't tell your father where you go, he'll have my head anyway. If you don't tell me in the next ten seconds, you might as well say goodbye to another of your sisters."

Moonracer spoke up, "We go to a magical underground place of gold, silver, and diamonds where twelve of the cutest princes await our coming and then we dance the night away with them."

"Take me to this place."

The one named Firestar stepped forward and lifted the rug in the middle of the room to reveal a trap door which concealed a flight of steps. There everything was just as Moonracer had said; an underground place of gold, silver, and diamonds. Starscream frowned. "And this went unnoticed _how_?"

Firestar shrugged her shoulders and started to lead the way back to the bedroom.

"Thanks for the answers, princesses. Good night." Starscream exited the room, locked it, and walked into his own.

There, he found Skywarp had crawled in with Thundercracker after all, and with a tired smirk, he took Skywarp's bed.

The next morning, as they stood before the king, Starscream and Thundercracker told him about where the princesses went every night, and the princesses(Slipstream had fully recovered from the null ray blast) hung their heads in shame.

"I thank you brave jets for what you have done. Each of you may now choose from among my daughters the one he loves best and take her for his wife."

The princesses all looked a little nervous.

"Well, actually," began Skywarp.

"I don't really-"stammered Thundercracker.

"Fact is, king, we aren't really in need of wives at the moment." Said Starscream, "So, see ya."

"But, good sirs," said the king, "I must repay you somehow. What would you have?"

Starscream looked at his companions and said, "I don't suppose you'd happen to have an M47 F component lying around anywhere?"

"Why, certainly! Here you are!"

Thus, with the requested component in hand, the trio set off back to their base.

"Hey, T.C.?" asked Skywarp.

"What?"

"How did you find out where the princesses go?"

"It was all quite simple. I examined their belongings closely and found traces of gold, silver, and diamonds on them. Then I discovered the trap door. I proceeded to deduce where the princesses had gone, and I was proved right when I went down the stairs."

"Wow-I didn't know were such a Sherlock Holmes! How'd you do it, Starscream?"

"Oh, I just threatened to shoot them unless they talked. I only had to shoot one of them before I got the grand tour of the underground place."

"You _shot _one of them?!" Thundercracker cried.

"An unarmed femme?" Skywarp's eyes were wide.

Starscream shrugged. "Sure. She was only out for two minutes. What did you think I did? Cluster-bomb her?"

"Yes."

"Umm-yeah."

"You have no faith in me. Besides, that would have been a waste of Cluster-bombs."

"Well, your way _was _pretty simple. But Warp here did worse than us. At least _we_ stayed awake."

"Yeah. Guess he really didn't want that girl he was talking so incessantly about."

"Hey, what? I was talking so what about?"

"Nonstop, ceaseless, continual, frequent, persistently, relentlessly, etc."

"You wouldn't shut up."

"Hey! I do too shut up sometimes! I'm not as bad as you think! In secret, I'm sure that Commander Megatron likes me the best of us because I'm such a hip dude! And I don't cold-shoulder or swagger!"

"Yeah, you only _never pipe down!"_

"I do not swagger!"

There were several minutes of silence, then Skywarp said slowly, "Um, guys?"

"What is it now, Warp?" said Starscream a bit testily.

"Why didn't you want to marry one of the princesses?"

"[sigh] I don't want to get married now. I'm not some old solider who has nothing better to do with his life than talk to old women with magic cloaks and 'do not drink the wine' advice, follow a bunch of princesses around for three nights eating their food and dancing while I'm invisible. Just not my cup of energon."

"Same here," agreed Thundercracker.

"Well, it would have been awesome if we had married them!"

"Skywarp, no princess in her right mind would marry you, much less let you rule a kingdom. Not with a clear conscience, anyway. T.C. and I , on the other hand, have better things to do."

"Yeah, like pummeling you until you scream like a little girl and beg for mercy!"

And as the other two jets pounced on him, Skywarp did just that.


End file.
